DeSoto County appeals EPA ruling on ozone levels

DeSoto County is challenging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's decision to group the county with Memphis on ozone levels.

At its Monday Board of Supervisors meeting, the board met in closed session to discuss litigation filed against the EPA.

Despite protests from county officials, the EPA stated in May that DeSoto County would remain on a "nonattainment list" along with Memphis and Crittenden County, Ark.

The county filed petitions for judicial review of the EPA decision in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on July 20, said Gary Rikard, an attorney with Butler Snow, who is representing the county on the issue.

The petitions, which request the court to review the EPA's final rule designating nonattainment areas for ozone pollution, were filed within a 60-day deadline imposed when the agency published the final rule in the Federal Register on May 21.

"A petition for review is an appeal or challenge to the nonattainment list," Rikard said. "We also filed a petition for reconsideration."

Rikard said the Mississippi Commission on Environmental Quality has also filed a review petition with the court.

Court records show that on July 26, the state's petition was consolidated with the county's case and several other parties, and now "constitutes the lead case for this consolidated matter."

Rikard said it could take until next summer for the court to make a decision on the issue.

The EPA ruled that DeSoto County's northern area, lumped in with Memphis and Crittenden County, is within the "marginal nonattainment" category, which is the lowest of five categories of areas that describe specific requirements for cleanup.

The county and state officials objected to this designation, saying that it will impair industrial recruitment by requiring prospective firms to install enhanced emission controls and by adding regulatory burdens to transportation projects in the growing county. Further, they say the EPA was unfair.

In 2004, the EPA did not list DeSoto in the Memphis nonattainment area because the county did not significantly contribute to ozone levels in the region.

Since then, ozone concentrations dropped even more in DeSoto, Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality director Trudy Fisher and staff told the DeSoto Appeal in May.